FRAN PAPPAS: A time for peace and a time for war

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

— Martin Luther King

I have been consumed with listening to the recent conflict of terror, murder, and destruction in Israel. Since its inception 75 years ago, Israel has faced continual threats from its enemies, and once again has become a focal point of world attention.

We are traumatized at the brutality, and we mourn. My heart cries for Israel, which cares about preserving all human life, seeks mercy and healing, and finds itself at a moral disadvantage. Whether or not Israel goes into Gaza to defend its freedom, it will be condemned by the world for killing innocent people.

Hamas’ brutality is cold-blooded and savage. With no regard for human life, it has murdered thousands of Jewish women, children, the elderly, quietly living their lives and is using its own civilians as human shields. Yet it is Israel that is being condemned for killing these civilians. Where is justice?

With this type of mentality, how can we protect and provide for the hostages, Jews and Americans, and bring them home safely? How can we rescue the Palestinians who have been injured, bring food, essentials, and medical supplies to those in need, when Hamas is keeping the hostages and civilians in the very tunnels filled with armaments?

Hamas is pursuing to eliminate the Jewish people, Israel, and by their admission, America and its citizens as well. Together with all its enemies, they will celebrate these deaths and get the results they seek, which is to be made martyrs, receive the world’s sympathy, and encourage anti-Semitism throughout the world, into our colleges, and in much of the world’s media that almost always faults Israel for anything bad that occurs in the region. Just recently the headlines of an Israeli bombing on a hospital in Gaza caused worldwide demonstrations against Israel before the truth was revealed.

Spreading lies is our greatest enemy. It can manipulate the media and many of our young students in our universities. Seemingly innocent, it’s outright vicious propaganda. If a lie is big enough and it keeps repeating, people will eventually come to believe it.

Why are there not serious sanctions put on Iran, and, if necessary, against Russia, North Korea, China, and any country supporting this brutality, and organizations promoting anti-Semitism? What is our government waiting for? Is it going to be responsible for another Holocaust?

What would we Americans do if it was our babies that had been beheaded, our women raped and killed, and the elderly, including Holocaust survivors, killed in our own country, home of the free, at the hands of our enemies?

There is a time for war, and a time for peace. A right time to wage war and another to make peace. (Ecclesiastes 3:8) Unfortunately, there is a time for war when peace will come no other way. Sometimes, peace needs war to clear the path for justice.

I’m not a historian or theologian; I am a teacher. I wonder how many know anything about Israel, the Gaza Strip; how many really understand what they are being told about the problem at large; the history of Israel, Palestine, Hamas, Hezbollah?

I seek the truth.